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Interval Training for Puppies

5:36pm By elevator ready to leave mommy's office for home. Ride elevator down to lobby, walk outside and pee (which, by the by, you haven't done since about 12:30pm, so not bad on the housetraining front). Sniff every several feet along the front of the building, occasionally making more than a few steps' progress before stopping. Make it to the middle of the quad only to see a) another dog, b) some birds, c) two little girls who at first are nervous but then want to "pet the puppy." Jump back and forth in play bows barking, but don't get near enough to the girls to be petted. Move a few more steps, stop and watch yet another dog. Somehow make it out of the first quad into the main part of campus, stop to sniff some students' feet (but not to be petted), poop, then chase more students.

5:49pm Leave campus, sort of (not the best road crossing, some dragging necessary not to get caught in the traffic, mild though it usually is). Start chasing bicycles and cars by running along the sidewalk until the leash jerks you short. Stop, sniff, occasionally notice that mommy is calling, "Let's go!" and start moving a few more steps. Repeat. Start to speed up just enough to make mommy think you might walk a whole block without stopping. Stop at least once every two houses. Pee. Catch sight of other pedestrians. Occasionally decide to follow after one of them, just at ankle level, making mommy run along behind the other person at just close enough distance to be somewhat uncomfortable. Stop and sniff the garbage on the ground. Do all of the above for two blocks east and three blocks north until you get to the main thoroughfare through the neighborhood. Refuse to go within a building's length of the road until mommy picks you up. Be sure to have walked through as many puddles as possible so that you are good and wet since she is in her dress-up clothes. Cross busy street in her arms.

6:09pm Arrive at the park where the dogs are usually playing. Run at top speed so that mommy can't keep up and has to stop to keep you from pulling. Stop and watch pedestrians. Look as if you want to say "Hi!" to the baby, but then start barking and running away when the people stop to pet you. Find something smelly to roll in. Be sure to stop and sniff every flower, blade of grass, stick, and tree. Run for a little bit when mommy tries to entice you with the ball that she has tied onto your old leash. Ignore her to watch somebody else struggling with her puppy on the lead. Find something smelly to roll in. Act as if you are going to follow another group of people, but still don't let them pet you. Stop. Try to go the other direction from the one in which mommy is facing. Tug really hard when she won't move. Run after mommy for about 10 steps when she makes that funny noise. Sniff the lamppost(s). Ignore mommy because all she has is that ball.

6:29pm Reach the edge of the park (about two and a half blocks north-east of where you entered). Start chasing cars. Try to say "Hi!" to the dogs walking down the sidewalk even when their person doesn't want them to. Sort of wait when mommy says to at the curb. Stop in the middle of the street to let the car go by that mommy thought had stopped. Finish crossing the street. Hear mommy explain that you are a corgi "which means 'dog' in Welsh." Hear man laugh: "That dog is called dog?!" Start following another woman at heel until mommy gets embarrassed and stops you. Walk faster than mommy can go comfortably for about half a block. Actually, make that most of the block. Carry on for two blocks north, then stop half a building away from the next busy road so that mommy can pick you up again. Struggle as you are being carried across the street. Stop to smell the flowers, drink in the puddles and watch other dogs for another block.

I know from the Facebook groups I belong to that many of his followers take Jordan as a kind of spiritual advisor, some would say guru. They spend thread after thread discussing how to live out his sayings.

Which would be fine.

If not for the fact that some of his sayings go directly contrary to the tradition in which he purports to be speaking.

I know, I fell for it, too. In Jordan’s powerful words:
Don’t underestimate the power of your speech! Now, Western culture is phallogocentric. Let’s say it... It is predicated on the idea of the Logos. The Logos is the sacred element of Western culture. What do…

One has just left this post on my own Facebook page about yesterday’s blogpost:
Another shameless post of mind-reading and armchair psychoanalysis with a bit of shock language thrown in for drama and clickbait. And unless you’re suggesting that a boyhood playground tussle is similar to a crucifixion your example of Mary is histrionic to the point of absurdity. If one were to play this same game directed at you they would say this is an example of an Oedipal Mother defending her sick need for her son’s dependence. That would be wrong to do of course—just as wrong as your misguided and unfounded attack that you have cloaked in fake compassion.
This is not a friend whom I know in person; she friended me almost exactly a year ago because she liked what I had said in Milo’s defense. She is much less happy about my re…

To be liable to being considered a heretic, my Facebook friends insist, you need first to declare yourself a believer, and it is not clear whether Peterson thinks of himself in those terms or not. One interviewer calls him “a devout Christian,” to which implied question he is quoted as answering, “Yes.” But when another interviewer asked, “You call yourself a Christian?,” he responded, “I don’t; other people do.”

Certainly, it is possible that he does not know the answer himself; he would most likely reply, “It depends on what you mean by believe.” But to judge from the responses my blogposts about him have been getting, many of my friends have been drawn to his lectures on the psychological significance of the Biblical stories as much by the thought that he is making Christianity if not great, at least interesting again, as …

The convener of one of the Jordan Peterson Facebook groups that I participate in has been pushing me for some time now to be more compassionate towards our professorial “father.” Or, as my friend puts it: “to take off your fencing gear and model the Nourishing Feminine.”

Okay, then, but I have to warn you. It is going to hurt.

What do I see when I look at Jordan Peterson with a mother’s eyes?

I should preface my reflections with the caveat that I speak here not just as the mother of a son, but also as an historian. Reading the textual accounts left by people about their thoughts and emotions is what I do in my scholarship. Just as Jordan has spent the past thirty years as a clinical psychologist, I have spent them as a reader of texts,* my goal as an author being to help the texts speak to audiences for whom they no longer mean anything. I have practiced listening to my texts just as Jordan has practiced listening to his patients, and I hope that I have been able to hear.

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The Merry Medievalist

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“You grasp my soul, and topple my enemies with it. And what is our soul? A splendid weapon it may be, long, sharp, oiled, and coruscating with the light of wisdom as it is brandished. But what is this soul of ours worth, what is it capable of, unless God holds it and fights with it? Any sword, however beautifully made, lies idle if there is no warrior to take it up.... So God does whatever he wishes with our soul. Since it is in his hand, it is his to use as he will." -- Augustine of Hippo, Exposition of Psalm 34 (35),trans. Maria Boulding, O.S.B.

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“The best way to pray is: stop. Let prayer pray within you whether you know it or not. This means a deep awareness of your true inner identity.... By grace we are Christ. Our relationship with God is that of Christ to the Father in the Holy Spirit." -- Father Louis, alias Thomas Merton